Local scientists develop fiberglass for space lab

A special kind of fiberglass developed by Donghua University scientists in Shanghai has been used to "knit" the "wings" of Tiangong-1, or Heavenly Palace, university officials said today.

The space lab module China launched on September 29 has fiberglass panels embedded with solar cells. They are lighter than the aluminum alloy panels used on spaceship Shenzhou 1 to Shenzhou 7.

Moreover, fiberglass is resistant to corrosion and oxidation when flying in the low Earth orbit, the scientists said.

However, this kind of fiberglass is too fragile to fabricate. The school scientists teamed up the Nanjing Fiberglass R&D Institute to develop the special fiberglass for the spacecraft.

Shanghai Donghua University is now working on new materials for satellite antenna to cut the country's dependence on foreign technology.


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